If you go by the dogma that any publicity is good publicity, Nokia is gaining fast

Since Nokia (OMXH: NOK1V) traditionally does not report numbers of sold phones before the quarterly report, speculation is still rampant on how the new Lumia smarpthones are being accepted in the market. Another sceptical report appeared in Reuters, saying that consumers just are not buying the phone. Some reports suggest otherwise, for example Telefónica UK Limited (O2) replied to media members asking on why Lumia 800 details had disappeared from the website that the phone is sold out from the online store and that the operator is happy about the sales.

These days it is awfully hard to get the true opinion in the internet; plenty of companies engage in manipulating results so that they appear in good light, or even go for double-agent duty and do just the opposite. British newspaper The Guardian reported that one employee from Microsoft and Nokia were commenting anonymously on negative reviews. This report is however very questionable, since the ‘evidence‘ came in violation of the site’s own privacy policy and could just be an attempt to boost traffic. To make matters worse, more and more bloggers and analysts can move the markets for their own benefit.

The renewed focus on how Nokia appears in mobile stores that CEO Elop alluded to in the recent interview in Finnish television is also taking shape. According to Nokia exec speaking to Mobile Today, a new stand called The Nokia Arch has caused a significant upsurge in Nokia phone sales at the Westfield Stratford shopping centre. This signals a move away from own-store strategy.

Judging from Nokia’s Blog, It would also appear that the company is starting to seize speaking of Symbian in connection with the new releases of the OS, instead speaking of Nokia Belle, Nokia Carla etc. There are also major expectations for CES 2012 on January 13th regarding news and products from Microsoft and Nokia.

In another piece of digging very deep for an article, Wall Street Journal citing anonymous sources wrote that Microsoft and Nokia senior executives had toyed with the idea of buying Research In Motion. Wall Street Journal's online poll on whether Microsoft and Nokia should do just that is pretty evenly split. No doubt many of the yes votes are from RIM shareholders. While Canadian company RIM and its iconic mobile device BlackBerry are pretty much an unknown to many European consumers, the company can still be considered a large player in the smartphone industry with a market cap of over 7 billion USD. While RIM has attracted interests from various companies during its prolonged slide, much in the same manner as Nokia has been experiencing, the company seems intent on trying to fix its problems on its own.